Monday, May 01, 2006

All-American Fundraiser

Every year, our elementary school PTA holds a Silent Auction to raise money for various projects and purchases. Last year’s auction raised about $8000. The auction features items donated by areas businesses (tickets to sporting events, spa weekends, Disneyworld passes etc). In addition, each class is responsible for putting together a themed basket with a value between $75 and $250. I volunteered to organize the class basket for my youngest son’s class because I saw (another!) opportunity to raise awareness about where products are made.

I share the final results in hopes of inspiring others who have fundraisers and have an interest in helping to save American manufacturing. Not to mention, it’s fun to go shopping with other people’s money!

I sent home several flyers with suggested products, prices, and where to buy them. Some American-made products are available at local retailers like Kmart and Lowe’s. Many others needed to be purchased on-line. I suggested that parents go shopping with their children and use the exercise as a chance to talk about where things are made. (I don’t get the feeling that many parents did this.) Parents were also given the option of making a cash donation and leaving the shopping in my expert hands.

Without breaking the bank, I could not find a basket made in USA so I painted a wooden craft crate and used that for my “basket.” I attached a list of contents, including information on the manufacturer for each item. The final basket (shown below) had a value of $225 and contained the following items:

Wholesale Pallets.com Are the worst company to deal with. Quality of pallets are bad. Never deliver on time and then they try to invoice you for more then they have delivered. Recommend buying pallets from someone else.

Wholesalepallets.com is a bad company to deal with take a look at all the lawsuits they are involved in. They don't ship product and then try to bill you for it. The complaints against them are very self evident